City's top-selling residential broker team jumps to new-in-town firm

The top-selling residential sales team in Chicago is joining a venture-capital-backed real estate firm based in New York.

Jeff Lowe and his team of 14 other professionals are leaving Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices KoenigRubloff Realty Group to launch the first Chicago office of Compass. The switch takes effect today, said Lowe, who's been selling homes in Chicago for 20 years.

Lowe's team was involved in more than a quarter-billion dollars of transactions in 2016, according to data compiled by RealTrends. The team represented buyer, seller or both on transactions totaling $255.6 million last year. That was over 40 percent more than the next highest volume sold by an Illinois brokerage team.

Lowe said he expects to finish 2017 higher.

Compass, which was in 10 U.S. markets before launching in Chicago this week, received $100 million from investors this month, according to TechCrunch, and already had more than $100 million in the bank. The company is valued at $1.2 billion.

Lowe said he joined Compass because "it's a different kind of company than anything in Chicago." He gave two reasons: technology and exclusivity.

Co-founded by the former head of engineering at Twitter, Compass positions itself as being an innovator in adapting technology for the real estate marketplace. Its search technology is designed to match buyers with properties that best suit them, according to press materials, and Lowe said "the experience of using the Compass website feels very much like 2017. I feel like the technology of the other brokerage firms feels like 1995."

For buyers and sellers, the result of better technology is "faster sales," Lowe said. A Compass press representative said in an email that in Washington, D.C., Compass-listed properties average 19 days on the market, compared with 30 days from the next-fastest-selling brokerage.

On exclusivity, Lowe said, "you're not dealing with a lot of agents who've been in the business for a year or two." Signing him is the first sign that Compass is going after high-level agents. Also joining Compass this week are Joe Siciliano, who left managing Coldwell Banker's Clybourn Avenue Lincoln Park office, and Lauren Mitrick-Wood, formerly an agent with Berkshire.

Both Lowe and two Compass press representatives said more new recruits will be identified soon.

Signing Lowe "is a head-turner, for sure," said Dennis Dooley, chief operating officer and managing broker at Property Consultants Realty, based in Bucktown. Dooley worked with Lowe in the past but is not involved with Compass. "When you can debut with someone who has the match with the consumer public that Jeff has, people will pay attention," Dooley said.

Lowe's departure from his old firm may leave a hole there. According to broker metrics data that Midwest Real Estate Data compiles, the Berkshire office at 2301 N. Clark St., where Lowe was stationed, did $547 million in sales volume in the past 12 months. Of that, Lowe's team did $263 million, or 48 percent.

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